Stanford Medicine, Google Team Up to Harness Power of Data Science for Health Care

According to a new press release out of the school, “Stanford Medicine and Google are working together to transform patient care and medical research through data science. The new collaboration combines Stanford Medicine’s excellence in health-care research and clinical work with Google’s expertise in cloud technology and data science. Stanford’s forthcoming Clinical Genomics Service, which puts genomic sequencing into the hands of clinicians to help diagnose disease, will be built using Google Genomics, a service that applies the same technologies that power Google Search and Maps to securely store, process, explore and share genomic data sets.”

The release continues, “Stanford Medicine includes the Stanford School of Medicine, Stanford Health Care and Stanford Children’s Health. Together, Stanford Medicine and Google will build cloud-based applications for exploring massive health-care data sets, a move that could transform patient care and medical research. ‘Stanford Medicine and Google are committing to major investments in preventing and curing diseases that afflict ordinary people worldwide. We’re proud to be setting this milestone for the future of patient care and research,’ said Lloyd Minor, MD, dean of the School of Medicine.”

The release goes on, “The agreement — considered key to Stanford Health Care’s development of the Clinical Genomics Service — makes Google Inc. a formal business associate of Stanford Medicine. As such, Google and Stanford will both comply with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, a federal law that regulates the privacy and security of medical information. HIPAA requires that Stanford Medicine patient data stored on Google Cloud Platform servers stay private. Patient information will be encrypted, both in transit and on servers, and kept on servers in the United States.”